Tom Venuto Speaks About Vince Gironda

Tom Venuto

When I hear that a “new” bodybuilding course is being launched on the Internet, usually I yawn, often I groan, and seldom do I give as much as second glance. But when I heard last week that a couple of guys had gotten together online to “resurrect” the long-lost methods of the late, great legendary bodybuilding trainer, The IRON GURU, Vince Gironda (1917-1997), they had my attention. In fact, I was excited!

Mike Westerdal, who might be best known for his bench press courses (amusingly, as Vince thought the bench press was a terrible exercise), joined forces with Alan Palmeiri, a man who knew Vince personally as a student through phone and correspondence courses (long before the days of email and computers).

Since Mike was savvy in online promotion, Alan updated his Gironda book with more information and gave Mike permission to re-publish it on the internet and Mike promised he would try to finally get the book – and Vince – the visibility it deserved.

That’s exciting because every Vince Gironda student, fan or friend I have ever known wanted Gironda’s legacy to be remembered. But strangely, just a decade and a half after his passing, many people have never even heard of Vince The Iron Guru even though he was one of the most famous bodybuilding trainers in history.

Some people who have heard of Vince, think he was an eccentric, cranky old curmudgeon whose methods were outdated years ago.

Ironically enough, just last week I made a post on my Burn The Fat blog about how there is really very little new under the sun in bodybuilding – mainly just new arrangements of old ideas… some of which are passed off as new, while the people who pioneered them years ago rarely get the credit they deserve.

I was writing about how the “old school” training methods going back a half a century or more were superior to much of what is being promoted in the bodybuilding world today as “breakthroughs.” I also talked about how today’s pro level physiques are all about “bulk and size at all costs” but the physiques of the pre-steroid era were far more beautiful… more symmetrical… more classical

That is what Vince Gironda was all about: He called it “creating an illusion” in the physique by carefully selecting your exercises and building up some areas while NOT building up others. That appealed to me.

Vince detested steroids and insisted that they ruined the physique. That appealed to me the most because I’m a lifetime natural pro-natural supporter to the core. Vince trained anyone that was sent to him but he preferred working with naturals.

Vince Gironda trained everyone who was anyone back in the 1960’s, 1970’s and 1980’s. Larry Scott, the first Mr. Olympia was one of Gironda’s STAR pupils. Mohammed Makkawy, Mr Olympia contender, was another. Vince’s Gym was frequented by a who’s who of bodybuilding superstardom, but what many people didn’t know was that Vince was the ORIGINAL trainer of the movie stars.

When the movie studios needed an actor to get in shape fast, they sent them to Vince’s gym in North Hollywood. The client roster included Erik Estrada, Ernest Borgnine, Gary Busey, David Carradine, Tommy Chong, Cher, Clint Eastwood, Marty Feldman, George Hamilton, Michael Landon, Burt Reynolds, Kurt Russell, John Schneider, Carl “Apollo Creed” Weathers… even the INfamous OJ Simpson.

Another little-known fact: Vince was Arnold’s Schwarzenegger’s first trainer. That’s right, when Joe Weider brought Arnold to America in the 1960’s, he sent him to the famous Vince’s Gym. What happened when those two egos met is the stuff of legend… and eyewitnesses swear it’s true.

A bulked-up Arnold shows up at Vince’s gym and says, “I am Arnold Schwarzenegger and I am going to be the greatest bodybuilder the world has ever known.” The irascible and inimitable Vince replies, “You look like a fat f*** to me!.

I’m not a movie star or a Mr. Olympia contender. I never even met Vince Gironda in person. He was on the West coast; I was on the East coast. So what’s the reason for MY interest in Vince?

Well, I’m a devoted student of the iron game and I’ve always studied all the greats, going back to the turn of the century strongmen through the “Golden Era.” But I REALLY studied Vince…

I was Vince’s mail order student in the 1980’s and 1990’s. I was not only a student, I was obsessed with Gironda-style training for many many years. I did some nutrition and training experiments based on Gironda’s methods that might seem so bizarre that when you read about them in upcoming blogs, you’ll probably think I was completely out of my mind!

I think I probably know as much about Vince’s methods as a person could know without having actually interacted with him personally and trained in Vince’s gym under his direct supervision.

I started reading the muscle magazines in 1983. The first one was Joe Weider’s Muscle and Fitness. But I had become obsessed with bodybuilding so it didn’t take me long to start picking up Robert Kennedy’s Muscle Mag International and Ironman Magazine, which at the time was still Peary Rader’s publication (it changed hands in 1986 I believe).

It turns out Robert Kennedy was good friends with Vince Gironda and gave Vince a column in Musclemag every month. I collected them and studied every word all through the 80’s and early 90’s. Vince also had articles frequently published in Ironman by him or about him. I collected all them too… and studied every word.

Then I noticed the classified ads for Vince’s famous bodybuilding courses and I ordered the first one. I was still a teenager. With the exception of the rare “red books” (the Vince Gironda Files), the courses were little booklets, usually under 20 pages. Vince signed most of them for me:

I didn’t have much money back then so I slowly purchased Vince’s courses one by one until I had collected every last one of them - there were about a dozen or so. It was the most fascinating stuff I had ever read… even if some of it seemed, well… weird.

Gironda’s methods WERE controversial. But even when he met with criticism, he was firm in his convictions. Many would call it dogmatic.

Tell people today that Vince forbade his students from doing back squats or bench presses because they would “ruin the physique” and you get some really weird looks.

Show some of Gironda’s recommended exercises to physical therapists today and they might say Gironda would be good for business.

Explain some of his nutrition theories to the science crowd today and you might hear “There’s no evidence for that whatsoever.”

But few people disagree that he was a genius and light years ahead of his time. Eccentric? A lot of people thought so. But if you really think about it, eccentricity and genius often go hand in hand. As with all visionaries, they are ridiculed first before they are accepted.

Today we can see that many of his ideas were right all along and yet there he was back in 1960, teaching those things long before there was any concrete evidence either way.

It’s all part of the Gironda legend and persona: genius, ahead of his time, bombastic, opinionated, dogmatic, eccentric, moody, controversial, misunderstood and many other adjectives have been used to describe him. He was a fascinating character and that’s why it’s so fun to read what he wrote and what was written about him.

Even if you disagree with Vince’s philosophies and don’t think you’d follow his methods, you can read his work as a piece of iron game history. But if you’re really smart, you’ll sift through Vince’s materials, simply ignore what doesn’t apply or what you don’t believe and you’ll pan out all kinds of nuggets of solid gold worth a fortune to any real student of the bodybuilding game.

If you knew who Vince Gironda was, or if you have ever been a Vince Gironda Fan, or if you’re a fan of Iron game history, you’ll love Alan Palmieri’s book. If this is the first time you’ve ever heard of Vince Gironda, the book is a great introduction to the man. Either way, this is a collectors item and a no brainer purchase, especially while it’s still on sale: http://www.criticalbench.com/gains/vince-gironda.

Mike explained to me clearly that this is NOT a reprint of Vince’s courses – it’s a book about Vince and his methods. I figured as much because I spent hours on the phone with Ron Kosloff years ago and at least at that time, Ron (a close personal friend of Vince’s before he died), was the man who retained the rights to Vince’s original materials.

But when I read Alan Palmieri’s book: Vince Gironda - Legend And Myth, I was surprised at how much of Vince’s course material has actually been included in there – actual details of his training methods. That’s probably because Vince’s info has been republished so many times in so many formats. I know that just from my Gironda article collection. So while this book is somewhat biographical and historical, it’s also a training and nutrition instruction manual.

It’s quite a hodge-podge of articles and information, but I mean that in a good way. There are also classic photographs in there that I had never seen before. And a picture is worth a thousand words in the case of Gironda.

This has rekindled my interest in Vince so much, I’ve decided I’m going to write a series of articles and blog posts about my personal experiences using Vince’s methods.

It’s going to be a trip because, man do I ever have stories:

“The Desiccated liver pills!”

Why I ate 3 dozen whole eggs a day

How I gained 12 lbs of solid muscle – STAGE WEIGHT MUSCLE – between summer 1989 and spring 1990 drug-free using one of Vince’s training systems

How I got an article about Vince published in IRONMAN magazine and it had the IRONMAN staff talking about it for months afterward

Why some of Vince’s followers who actually trained with him in person got pissed off at me

Raw eggs and cream… drink of champions?

I think I ate an entire cow once. Literally… find out why

My first ketogenic diet attempt, Vince’s way

And a lot more

I’m not sure if anyone has ever critically analyzed Vince’s methods. I don’t agree with everything he taught – most people don’t – he was HIGHLY controversial – totally against the grain. But you don’t have to agree with EVERYTHING he said.

I always found that Vince had such a loyal fan following – as do so many “gurus” - that if you criticized his methods, YOU were criticized by his followers. But I’m a student, not a follower. I don’t use the “follow blindly” method. I use the Bruce lee method: Analyze your experience. Take what is useful and keep it. Discard what is not useful. Add what is uniquely your own. That’s how I approached Vinces materials and that’s how I recommend others approach it today.

Don’t get me wrong. I was an excellent student. When I tried something he recommended, I followed it to a T, just as he recommended it, at least once. I feel you OWE that to anyone you entrust as your coach, not to mention, you’ll never know unless you try it. But if I tried it faithfully and didn’t work or if I didn’t like it, I threw it away or modified it.

What I DON’T recommend is a closed mind or disregarding everything he said just because you don’t like a few things he said. I guess that’s my way of saying, don’t throw out the baby with the bathwater.”

So in the upcoming articles, I’ll be going through Vince’s techniques and giving you my personal opinion about his controversial ideas and philosophies. But I’ll also analyze it all with a critical thinking or scientific mind as well.

I’ll be adding more articles about Vince’s techniques all week long… And I’ll keep writing them until I get bored! (and if you have any questions, please post them in the comments below - If you email me, it will just go into a mailbox with a thousand other unread emails, but I WILL check back on these comments..

-Tom Venuto

Published on 11 October, 2011

Comments

Tom,
This sounds like its going to be a treat for your readers. I think I have everything Vince published. And even today I still take liver tabs. I am still an "old schooler" at heart, I am looking forward to this series.

Posted on Oct 11, 2011 07:28 PM

Adriann said:

Very exciting Tom,
I'm looking forward to reading your stories. Since I am a new to the sport, what an opportune time to invest. Thanks for the link.
Adriann

Posted on Oct 11, 2011 10:50 PM

Peter W Roberts said:

Hi Tom
Great info I did not know you were a fan of the "Iron Guru" until now. As with you i followed Vince through Musclemag and other articles and even brought the excellent book published by Bob Kennedy "Unleash the Wild Physique". As you say he was one in a few million way out there but the mavericks make history. The routines he recommended are of legend and very taxing, as were the diet plans but man he was never boring or one dimensional. He produced a string of outstanding physiques Don Howarth being a prize example shoulders like cannon balls. Thanks again for the article it really caught my attention, keep up the good work. Peter

Posted on Oct 11, 2011 10:52 PM

Theo Thurston said:

Tom, I'm looking forward to your blog posts about Vince's methods you experimented with. I think Arnold recommended eating whole eggs in his encyclopedia, and drinking shakes with cream and raw eggs. Maybe he learned it from his first trainer in America.

Posted on Oct 11, 2011 11:05 PM

dario said:

Well Tom this article is very inspiring, thanks for being here for us, I hope to have more time for read all you write, best regards Dario Schneider

Posted on Oct 11, 2011 11:11 PM

Johnny said:

hey Tom, I remember reading something you'd written about how eating all those eggs didn't bring any of the results you wanted. By the way, I found that too!

Hi Tom, I really like your articles. I really look forward to your information on Vince. I remember one article he wrote in Ironman that focused on developing the upper pecs. It was great. Take care Tom.

Larry

Posted on Oct 12, 2011 12:09 AM

Alan said:

This will be great, so looking forward to your remembrances and information. A big fan of Vince and excited to see he hasn't been forgotten.

Posted on Oct 12, 2011 01:07 AM

Andrew said:

Hi Tom - I have your BFM and Holy Grail books and am a member of your IC and really love it "in there" - it's really helping me. I had not heard about Vince Gironda until I started working out and reading more online etc. Anyway, my question is basically about the book your are promoting on this page. Have you read it and do you recommend it? Money is always tight but I am very interesting in buying this ebook (though I wish all you internet guys would offer printed versions sometimes or even Kindle versions!!).

Are there lots of Vince's workouts/exercises in there for example?

Maybe as part of your articles you could suggest some printed materials that feature Vince's programs etc?

Andrew - i NEVER promote or endorse something i dont own and havent read. I have this gironda book and II love it - but naturally, because Ive always been a gironda fan and IM a collector

Its a hodge podge of excerpts and articles so if youre looking for a step by step guide to training then its not for you. the nutrition info I really dont follow; I tried all girondas nutrition stuff 20 - 25 years ago. It was enlightening but I dont use that approach anymore.

as you know I have my own system that works for me and Ive made it flexible and adaptable to work for others. .. Vince's training info is full of gems. It will be appreciated the most by: bodybuilders, students of the iron game and iron history, vince gironda fans, students of old school training methods...

Also, if you dont have the capacity of discernment to sift through info and pick what you like and what applies - as scott mentioned above - then dont bother. Those who are looking for a book with an A to Z step by step program where you intend to take all the advice would just get lost in this one. Like i said this is a hodge/podge a collection of mixed/ assorted information from the iron guru.

steve -- chest? WIDE GRIP DIPS (V-Bar dips), elbows wide, feel underneath you, chin on chest, looking down. Gironda favorite and a favorite of mine. My gym actually has that V shaped dipping bar - old school baby! Good luck finding THAT one in 24 hour fitness. Will write more about the gironda exercises later. (PS he did recommend bench to neck, though Im going to write up the pros and cons of that exercise in one of the next articles)

Posted on Oct 13, 2011 09:28 AM

Chris said:

I have the original Vince Gironda book plus Unleash The Wild Physique. But I look forward to reading your articles to find out what methods really worked and what didn`t, from someone who tried them all. I have been a bit wary of trying some of his techniques for fear of eventual joint problems, so I would welcome your opinion on them.

Posted on Oct 13, 2011 11:18 AM

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